human rights: 25/50 of 163

For Saskatchewan, uranium is an important part of the economy, but for the province's indigenous peoples, the land is everything. It is filled with relationships between beings who dwell together in an interconnected web. Their traditional ecological knowledge is not just a set of terms or data, but a deep, broadly-viewed reality which contains systematic respect for all creation.more...

Less than two weeks after the murder of Honduran eco defender Berta Caceres, another indigenous leader has been shot dead during the violent police and military eviction of 150 families from the settled community of Rio Chiquito. International funders of the controversial Agua Zarca hydro project are now backing out..more...

Last week the environmental and human rights activist Berta Cáceres was murdered by gunmen in an early morning attack on her home which may have been carried out by or in collusion with state agents. Now her friend and colleague Gustavo Castro, himself wounded in the attack and the only witness to Berta's murder, has been detained for questioning.more...

WWF’s support for 'fortress conservation' has led to serious human rights abuses for indigenous peoples, writes Lewis Evans, and nowhere more so than in Cameroon, where the Baka are considered trespassers and poachers in their own ancestral forests. A formal complaint against WWF's behaviour is now in process.more...

Berta Cáceres, Honduran indigenous and environmental rights campaigner, has been murdered, days after she was threatened for opposing a hydroelectric project, writes Jonathan Watts. Her death has prompted international outrage, and a flood of tributes to a courageous defender of the natural world.more...

The humanitarian crisis in Gaza has worsened after floods and purposeful destruction has taken its toll in recent months, writes Vanessa Amaral-Rogers. The eight year blockade by Israel and conflict with Egypt has already hit Palestinian families hard but now Gaza is at even greater risk as Egypt diverts seawater into life-line tunnels.more...

The defence secretary, 'comedians' on BBC Radio's News Quiz, and the entire media commentariat have ganged up this weekend up to pour mockery and poisonous lies over Julian Assange and the UN's human rights jurists, writes Jonathan Cook. As they attempt to fight off the UN's 'guilty' verdict against the British state, they are putting dissidents at risk everywhere.more...

The human rights campaigner Julian Assange has suffered arbitrary detention by the governments of Sweden and the UK, the HRC's Working Group on Arbitrary Detention ruled today. Here we present the key elements of the Ruling so readers can form their own opinion on the issue free of the universal condemnations of Assange and the Ruling evident in mainstream media.more...

How can progressive movements rise above merely being right, to mount effective mass opposition to corporate rule and the dictatorship of the super-wealthy? By learning from Gandhi, writes Colin Todhunter, and devising new campaigns that engage with people's everyday concerns - like access to safe, wholesome, affordable, 'open source' food.more...

Israel's government is now free to expel 1,200 of its Bedouin citizens from their 'unrecognised' villages in the Negev desert, following a Supreme Court decision not to hear their appeal. Now only one thing can save the Bedouin, their communities and their way of life: an international outcry.more...

The Philippines is taking a huge leap forward in the climate wars, writes Ellen Baker, with the world's 'top 50' energy giants standing accused of violating international human rights law as a result of their fossil fuel production. This is the first such investigation ever to take place anywhere in the world - and it just opened up a whole new front of corporate vulnerability.more...

In a landmark judgment today, four Niger Delta farmers have won the right to sue Dutch oil multinational Shell in the Netherlands courts after oil spills destroyed their farms and fish ponds. The case sets a precedent for other victims of corporate environmental and human rights harms around the world.more...

human rights: 25/50 of 163

In this joint statement to COP21 Amnesty International and Greenpeace International call on all governments to protect human rights by including making respect for human rights an explicit purpose of any agreement, while agreeing to phase out fossil fuels and deliver 100% renewables for all by 2050.more...

A new movement has been launched at COP21 in Paris to give legal effect to the rights of nature and communities, writes Hal Rhoades, providing effective protection against the gross environmental damage and human rights violations that accompany extractive industries from mining to oil development and agri-business projects, and which underlie climate change.more...

The massacre of elephants for Asian ivory trade is driving the iconic African giant to extinction, writes Lewis Evans. But the 'military response' is both brutal and ineffective, all the more so as it excludes and alienates the indigenous communities who are the best defenders of nature and wildlife. The simplistic message of 'Last Days of Ivory' is both damaging and dangerous.more...

As Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy takes a strong lead in Burma's elections, Nafeez Ahmed warns that the military will remain the real power in the land. And as UK, EU, US, Chinese and Gulf state energy corporations compete to exploit Burma's hydrocarbons, don't expect them to denounce the ongoing genocide of the Rohingya, and anyone else in the way of their oil and gas infrastructure.more...

As the world's media hails Burma's first elections since 1990 and the country's 'democratic transition' from military rule, Guy Horton warns against the delusional thinking that underlies these optimistic narratives. The reality is one of fascism, mass murder, genocide and systematic discrimination - in which Aung San Suu Kyi herself is complicit through her silence.more...

The uprooting and cutting down of over a million olive and fruit trees in occupied Palestine since 1967 is an attack on a symbol of life, and on Palestinian culture and survival, writes Dr. Cesar Chelala. A grave crime under international humantarian law, the arboricide is also contrary to Jewish religious teachings.more...

India's neoliberal government is attempting the mass seizure of indigenous lands, commons and forests in order to hand them over for corporate exploitation with mines, dams and plantations, writes Pushpa Achanta. But tribal communities are rising up to resist the takeover, which is not only morally reprehensible but violates India's own laws and international human rights obligations.more...

Last week BP's Peter Mather - who claims to have 'green and yellow oil' flowing in his veins - took to the airwaves on Radio 4's The Bottom Line'. Evan Davies asked some tough questions, writes Chris Garrard - but failed to mention the shocking case of Colombian trades unionist Gilberto Torres, kidnapped and tortured for 42 days by paramilitaries employed by BP's joint venture partner.more...

Sue Lloyd Roberts, the brilliant investigative journalist who died yesterday, was a unique phenomenon in the BBC, writes Oliver Tickell - fearless, rooting out the dirtiest of secrets, fighting the cause of the oppressed, abused, exploited and downtrodden. Now the BBC must keep her mission alive with a new, independent unit dedicated to human rights worldwide.more...

Under new planning rules, Travellers and Gypsies must be able to prove they are actually traveling to qualify for limited planning benefits to create new sites. But for many, it's impossible to do that. Not only to remain in employment, or education - but precisely because there are so few sites, that they are unable to travel.more...

Coming so soon after the Magna Carta celebrations, the eviction and destruction of the Runnymede Eco-village is a parable of our times, writes Nicholas Sebley: a violent assertion of the power of capital over people and community, and part of a deliberate, systematic closure of alternative ways of living outside the mainstream economy.more...

British Prime Minister David Cameron is receiving Israel's Benjamin Netenyahu into his Downing Street home just as Israel embarks on its ethnic cleansing of the Negev, writes Alia Al Ghussain. The imminent demolition of the 'unrecognised' Bedouin village of Umm Al Hiran and the eviction of its residents looks like the realization of the 'Prawer Plan' to Judaize the desert.more...

Indigenous Australians are systematically deprived of the benefits of mining and other developments, writes Seán Kerins, and being left to suffer their environmental impacts. As Abbott's government prepares a bonfire of 'red tape', it's time to put Indigenous interests first, and place their communities at the centre of decision making.more...